


up so floating, many bells down

by dramady



Category: Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-04
Updated: 2010-04-04
Packaged: 2017-10-08 17:15:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/77745
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dramady/pseuds/dramady
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Valentines might be a created holiday, but even the Connors are a part of it, willingly or not.</p>
            </blockquote>





	up so floating, many bells down

Grocery shopping has become one of her duties. List in hand, Cameron walks down each aisle, even if she doesn't need to. She's in the middle of the store when she stops, holding the handle to the cart as she looks both ways. Red is the predominant color with accents of white, perhaps lesser-quality lace. She watches a thirty-six-year-old overweight blond woman pick up a plastic bag and set it in her basket. When she walks away, Cameron goes over to the rack and picks up the bag. One of the sugar candies inside the bag says "I ♥ you."

* * *

I ♥ you. A little candy heart that tastes like chalk.

John tosses the heart into the trash on the first shot, _score!_, making raucous crowd noises before looking around. No one overhears him.

I ♥ you.

His mom loves him; she's kind of morally obligated to.

Cameron said she did, but she's a machine. She can feel the wind through her fingers, saying that she feels. That's not emotion. Sensation.

Then there's Riley. John still has the LEGO robot she made for him, sees how her body looks under her wet clothes in that crappy hot tub.

* * *

Standing in front of the stove, spatula in hand as the pancakes rise, Sarah sees the shadow and knows it, not turning her head. She hears the vague clatter of something on the counter and her eyes cut that way. A small valentines candy. Squinting she sees _I ♥ you_. Turning the other way, she watches the figure wearing a hoodie disappear around the corner, out of sight. Looking at the candy again, there's a small curving at the corner of her mouth. Those things taste like chalk; she touches it with the end of the spatula.

* * *

"The heart is indicative of love."

John rolls his eyes. "Well, yeah."

"So it's unnecessary to spell out 'I love you' on the small surface."

"Yeah." Trust Cameron to boil all the romance right out of anything. He doesn't ask about the chemical make up of the candy.

"Valentine's Day is a social convention."

Looking up from his computer, John frowned. "What?"

"It's not like Christmas or Easter, which have Judeo-Christian roots. Valentine's Day is a social convention."

"Oookay. Good to know." Shaking his head a little bit, John goes back to the program he's working on cracking.

* * *

"You got me candy."

Over the phone, he can hear Riley smile. Even in the privacy of his room, he turns toward the wall as he smiles. "Well, it is Valentine's day."

"I didn't figure you for a romantic, Cat Fancy."

"What's romantic about Valentine's Day anyway? It's a social convention," John says, eyerolling himself.

"It is?"

"Well, yeah." But he doesn't elaborate. She doesn't ask him to.

There's crunching over the line. John laughs, a little.

"I love this stuff. It kind of tastes like chalk, have you ever noticed?"

Scratching at the wallpaper, John nods. "Yeah, I noticed."

* * *

The half-bag of candy that's left is spread over the table. Derek leans, elbows on the table. Unblinking, he studies each piece of candy. _Ur mine_. _Be Mine_. _2gether_.

He snorts. _I ♥ you_.

Fucking things taste like chalk, which doesn't explain why he keeps eating them, one at a time, letting them melt on his tongue, the sweetness sliding down his throat slowly.

He thinks of Jesse who would ask him if he was feeling all right if Derek took some to her. Funny Derek. Another candy on his tongue. _4ever_. It melts quickly.

* * *

The house is too quiet. Michelle hadn't been big on holidays either, except for Christmas. But he'd always gotten her a card, picked it up on the way home from work on that day. Even candy sometimes. Charley goes to the corner store for a six-pack of beer and he can't escape all the stuff; it's right as he comes in the door and he has to pass the candy aisle to get to the beer. _ I don't love her anymore, not like that._

No candy can make up for that. He gets two six packs.

* * *

_Sun, moon, stars, rain. _

John's eaten too much candy and feels vaguely ill. He leans back from his computer.

_someones married their everyones_.

Somehow in his surfing, he'd come across a poem.

_then one day anyone died I guess/ (and noone stooped to kiss his cheek)._

God, depressing. How'd he eaten so much candy?

"What are you reading?" Sarah, over his shoulder.

"Uh--"

She scans the screen. "A poem?"

"I was searching for something else."

He can hear her breathing as she reads it.

"That doesn't make any sense."

John shrugs and eats another candy.

* * *

Most of them can't even remember what candy tastes like. But they talk about it. A lot. It's a good way to pass the time. Today, Kyle has that fucking picture out, staring at it, wearing this little smile, and Derek can barely fight the urge to rip that fucking thing out of his hand and shoot it for good measure. "What're you doing?!" he finally asks.

Kyle looks up, who me?

Who else?

A shrug. "Maybe she likes those little candy hearts. Remember those?"

"Yeah. I remember."

Kyle's smile grows. "They tasted awful."

"Yeah. They fucking did."

* * *

It's spaghetti. Red sauce, Valentine's day, get it? John gives Sarah a smile as he picks up his fork, even if he's not hungry.

Nobody seems to be eating very much. The bag that Cameron bought seems to have disappeared, though, if asked, no one would own up to taking any of the candies. But they all just twirl their forks in the pasta and don't eat it. John's waiting to feel less nauseous, Derek's just not hungry, and Sarah has, in her room, in the drawer in the bedside cabinet, a chalky pink candy heart that says _I ♥ you_.


End file.
